fiscal cliff - All posts tagged fiscal cliff

Thanks to the results of what had to be a dud of a New Year’s party in Washington — one that may or may not have included the House Speaker playing the part of the drunk uncle and flinging expletives at the Senate Majority Leader — the bulls are on parade across the global markets to start 2013.

John Boehner, go ahead, that’s right, let it all out. This time around you’d be excused for a quivering lip and flowing tears. In fact, so would investors who found themselves on the wrong side of the S&P last night.

Stocks will probably start where they left off Tuesday, meandering in a holiday-week haze around the flat line. U.S. markets tend to push higher during the four days surrounding Thanksgiving, and the consolidating action we're seeing after Monday's big surge should go a long way in soothing jitters.

The mere whiff of progress on the fiscal-cliff front last week has markets from Germany to Japan in rally mode, and the U.S. is poised to follow suit. There’s still the proliferating violence in the Middle East and the holiday-shortened week’s expected light volume days that could throw investors curve balls in the coming days. But for now, stocks are clawing their way into positive territory.

Get ready for still more carnage as there seems to be less and less to be thankful for from a market perspective as we head into the holiday-shortened week. Earnings aren’t helping. Fiscal-cliff fears have overstayed their welcome. And short sellers don’t seem to be in any hurry to cover their positions. So what’s there to look forward to? Let’s take a look around.

Just like yesterday, the markets are shaping up for an early rebound. We all know how that turned out by Wednesday’s close. Of course, the fiscal cliff takes the brunt of the blame. And it likely will again if stocks don’t move higher. Even U2′s Bono got into the act, warning that the spending cuts will put thousands of lives in jeopardy.

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